As telecommunication technology evolves, an increasing number of applications are available to users. Many of these applications (e.g., video on demand) utilize substantial network resources, particularly bandwidth. The utilization of such applications creates an ever increasing demand on the limited resources of telecommunications providers. In an effort to manage such resource demands, telecommunications providers often employ network policies to limit resource utilization. Employing a policy scheme allows a network provider to offer its most demanding users, who may be willing to pay greater service charges, the high quality of service (QoS) required by such resource-hungry applications. Additionally, policy schemes may enable telecommunications providers to incentivize desired behavior on the part of their subscribers.
Modern telecommunication devices often include technology for determining a network device's geographic location. For example, many modern network devices are equipped with global positioning system (GPS) technology. Additionally, telecommunications providers are often able to accurately locate network devices based on their proximity to various network resources. Existing network architectures, however, have failed to fully appreciate the possibility that a network device's policy attributes may be manipulated based on its location. Utilizing such a location-based policy scheme, may enable telecommunications providers to incentivize behavior that benefits providers, users, and third parties alike.
Accordingly, a need exists for methods, systems, and computer readable media for location-based policy enhancement.